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World Bank to provide Togo with $14 million anti-malaria grant

The World Bank announced on Wednesday that its International Development Association would provide the nation of Togo with a $14 million grant to protect vulnerable women and children from malaria and malnutrition.

The grant for the Togo Maternal and Child Health and Nutrition Services Project will concentrate on lowering the child mortality rate and on saving the lives of mothers. According to the World Bank, the four-year project could save as many as 17,000 lives during the period.

"I am delighted that we are able to support Togo in one of its most important undertakings, which is to deliver much-needed basic health and nutrition services to under-served people," Hervé Assah, the World Bank's country manager for Togo, said. "Faster progress in women's and children's health is absolutely critical to meet the Millennium Development Goals, and to Togo's onward development as a nation."

The grant will provide for nationwide anti-malaria efforts and nutrition services concentrated in the regions of Plateaux and Centrale.

"In many African countries, child mortality has been falling rapidly in recent years as a result of similar efforts to deliver basic health services, and we have every reason to expect that this success will be replicated in Togo as well," Chris Atim, the World Bank's task team leader for the project, said.

The World Bank's IDA has the goal of helping the world's poorest countries by providing credits and grants for projects and programs to reduce poverty, boost economic growth and improve poor people's lives. The World Bank seeks the reduction of extreme poverty and an increase in shared prosperity.